ApplyTexas Essay Prompts

ApplyTexas Essay Prompts and How to Succeed with Them

If you’re applying to college in Texas, chances are you’re familiar with ApplyTexas. There are several essay prompts, and different colleges and universities require different prompts, so be sure to check the admissions web site of the colleges you’re applying to before you prepare your essays. Most students applying to college in Texas will need to familiarize themselves with ApplyTexas essay topics A, B, and C, so that’s what this article is about! So let’s learn about what Topic A, Topic B, and Topic C are asking you to do!

ApplyTexas Topic A: Environment/Family/Home/Community

Topic A from the ApplyTexas web site asks the following:

What was the environment in which you were raised? Describe your family, home, neighborhood, or community, and explain how it has shaped you as a person.

Notice that the prompt’s overall task is for you to convey an image of the environment in which you were raised. The admissions officers want to learn about where you come from, and they want to see that you have an understanding of how environmental factors have influenced you as a person.

To succeed at this essay, you’ll need to focus on one or two significant aspects of your upbringing, and there are no wrong answers. Paint a vivid picture of your family dynamic, early childhood, experience as a community member. Once you’ve described the circumstances surrounding your upbringing, comment on those circumstances. If you’ve experienced hardship, what has it taught you? Explain the values you have in this world and explain how your upbringing inspired those values in you.

ApplyTexas Topic B: Identity/Interest/Talent

Topic B from the ApplyTexas web site asks the following:

Most students have an identity, an interest, or a talent that defines them in an essential way. Tell us about yourself.

This is a critical essay to get right. College is about exploring different interests, but it’s also about taking talents and interests you already have to the next level. If there’s a specific aspect of your identity that defines the way you see yourself, now’s your chance to explain that identification and why it matters to you and will matter to you in college. Most commonly, students write about their passions in this essay, whether they be for computers, farm life, musical theater, or stamp-collecting. There’s no wrong answer, but the admissions committee wants a glimpse into your interests. They want to see how you’ve developed your interests, passions, and hobbies over time, and how your conception of yourself has grown and changed relative to those interests.

To succeed on Topic B, choose one identity, passion, or interest, and illustrate to the reader how that concern has grown and changed with you. How does it relate to your college pursuits? Will you continue developing your passion, and, if so, how? What have you learned? What do you hope to achieve? How might college help you get there?

ApplyTexas Topic C: Ticket to Anywhere

The ApplyTexas web site lists Topic C as follows:

You’ve got a ticket in your hand—where will you go? What will you do? What will happen when you get there?

What an exciting topic! Now’s your chance to show the admissions committee where you dream of going! Again, there’s no right or wrong answer. Destinations could be the past, the future, events in history, impossible scenarios, cities, states, countries, music festivals–you name it! Don’t feel limited to “conventional” answers to this question, although conventional answers certainly work well!

How to succeed on this topic? Choose a clever or unique destination, paint a vivid picture of that destination, and explain what made you choose it, why you’re exciting for it, and what you might learn from it. How does your choice shed light on who you are as a person? How does it relate to your identity, personality, interests, and passions?

How Long Should ApplyTexas Essays Be?

Your essays should be no longer than 650 words each. That is NOT a lot of words, so it’s vital that you capture the essence of what you’re trying to say. Most students write and revise multiple drafts of each essay, with an eye toward originality, inventiveness, uniqueness, and, of course, word economy. How can you set yourself apart and dazzle the admissions committee with only 650 words per essay? The answer is to think very carefully about who you are, what you want, and what you’re going to say! Good luck, and let us know if you need help!

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That’s it! For more college essay tips, or SAT and ACT prep tips, check out the rest of our blog. Looking for 1-on-1 ACT or SAT prep tutoring to help you with the college application process? Want to join an SAT or ACT group class? Contact us today! We’re perfect-scoring tutors with years of experience helping students achieve the SAT and ACT scores they need to make their dreams a reality!